The following is an example of my daughter’s dialogue, spoken over the first ten minutes of pretty much any film that you could think of, that is suitable for children aged four. It doesn’t matter what genre it is, it will always follow the same pattern…

In case you are wondering, while they don’t say anything, I get the feeling that the staff at Intermarche ( a French chain of supermarkets) frown about this misuse of mini trolleys.

Plus points? It allows your kids to comfortably play the motion-control game that your son insists on playing (‘just for five minutes daddy’) every time you go in there. Your daughter can also sit beside him as though she’s at the cinema, and ensure that she is in ‘striking distance’ for when it inevitably kicks off.

Negative points? You try pushing two of these while carrying a pack of beer, a pizza, a loaf of bread and some milk (yes, ‘les essentials’) it’s not easy and balancing them on the kids just looks wrong.

They do make an excellent battering ram though, if you encounter any ‘dawdlers’ in the chilled meats section.

The photograph was taken in the back garden** of her French granddad, or ‘papy’ as they are called in France.

She’s such a perfect specimen and yet, as I type this, she’s sat on the toilet, giving us a blow-by-blow account of what she’s doing. I won’t fill in the blanks too much, but I would really rather not have a ‘director’s commentary’ if I’m being honest.

I could also do without all the grunts.

They can be perfect.

They can be perfectly vile.

Here she just looks perfect.

Clothes from the French market.

Looks from Mummy.

Brains from Mummy.

Stick from Daddy.

*It’s early days, I’m sure we will take many more photographs, but so far this is my favourite.

**I use the term ‘back garden’ in its loosest possible sense – ‘vast field’ would be more appropriate. They have land to spare in this glorious country.

My daughter is going through a phase. It’s just the age, people tell me. She’ll grow out of it. Thing is, I’m not so sure it is just a phase. I think it’s all part of a much grander, devious scheme. You’d think I’m talking about some evil, megalomaniac genius here with what I’m about to say. And to that I’d say ‘Oh, so you’ve met my daughter then?’.

So what’s the phase? Collecting small-to-medium sized stones, filling her pockets with them and then ‘redistributing’ them in useful areas such as car seats, cups, your pockets and in bed (s). What I think her actual plan is: to dig a tunnel with her fellow nursery pupils, so that they can escape from nursery whenever they want.

This occurred to me the other day, after I’d collected her from her maternelle (the French name for nursery) and picked up her coat, as she got out of the car. This is heavy, I thought to myself. I soon realised why, as stone after stone fell out, forming piles on the car park floor. You may think I’m exaggerating by describing it like this, but it looked liked someone was staging a mock-recreation of The Blair Witch’s burial mounds. And that was after a good handful had been left in her seat as well. She just grinned at me, in a slightly sinister all-I’m-lacking-is-a-white-cat-to-stroke kind of way.

Blofeld ain’t got nothing on her, you wait and see.

The neighbour saw me, said hello and looked at what I was doing. I explained the stone-fetish. ‘It’s just the age’ she said to me.

Except she didn’t say it like that – in English – because she’s French.

So a few stones, OK, I get that. But these quantities? It’s been over a week since those stones were left on our – relatively busy – car park and they’re still there, they have strength in numbers you see. Either that or people actually think if they move them the Blair Witch of the car park will get them and…I don’t know, scratch their cars? Adjust their seats? Tune their radio-stations to a channel that plays Clean Bandit’s Symphony on an endless loop?

I can just picture her though, sat in a chair while drinks are brought to her, hunched over her tunnel-plans, gaining favour amongst her peers with her scheme to tunnel to the playground. All the while hiding this in plain sight by having all the kids ‘redistribute’ the displaced stones in useful areas that they will blend in to with ease, such as baths, stairs, inside shoes and underneath car brake pedals. She’ll egg them on with promises of slides, sunshine, fun and games and no adults around.

Today I had a good time as I went to the library and I read a good book called ‘T’choupi jardine’ and it was good because I understood every word and I felt that was a massive achievement even though my kids and partner laughed at me and the librarian looked at me like I was ‘different’.

I love T’choupi because he spends time with his daddy and they have fun and it is a great book and he helped his daddy in the garden and then they planted seeds and T’choupi thought his flowers would grow but daddy said ‘No you must wait T’Choupi’ which chuffed T’choupi off a bit but that’s kids for you. And daddy asked T’choupi to go in the house but T’choupi wouldn’t because kids never do what you tell them and he wanted to stay outside and watch his flowers grow but they didn’t because it was not time for them to grow yet which he would know if he had listened to his daddy.

I like T’choupi, and I am a big boy now because I read the whole thing and I understood it all. OK, page 7 was a bit tricky but apart from that It was great and then I had a lollipop.

Here’s a couple of oddities that have crossed my path this week in the land of love and wine. And cheese.

They just seemed a bit…odd – see if you think so too…

I saw this in my local Intermarche, a chain of French supermarkets that sell just about everything, however I think they may have overstepped the mark here:

Selling an overpriced fridge adorned with a Union Jack… is the manager having some sort of a bet as to who can sell the craziest item in our town? If I go to my local Aldi will I find a washing machine for sale decorated with the German national flag for 350 Euros?

I then Received my first batch of contact lenses, from Vision Direct in France, excellent service, arrived really quickly and they are settling into my Anglais eyeballs a treat. I do, however, have to question their choice of free gift that came in the packaging. 10% off voucher for next time? Complimentary bottle of contact lens solution? No, they went for something a bit different….

How old do these people think I am? But, more importantly, one packet of Haribos? Do they know what will happen in my household if the kids see this lonely item? Do you remember the scene from The Dark Knight, where the Joker, after defeating a fellow crime-lord and staring his three lackies down, informs them he has an opening in his gang, but there’s only one place? He then gives them a broken snooker cue, and tells them to fight it out.

Well, the results of the one-pack-of-Haribo situation will be just like that.

My son is very, very creative. He’s seldom seen without a colouring pencil in his hand, drawing up a storm. He’s got a great unique style too, something I don’t have, but can recognise. I like to think I’m OK at writing, but he blows me out of the water when it comes to drawing. Lately he has been turning his attention to his large collection of Lego, and the results have been fantastic. I should add that he didn’t use any pictures, guides or anything like that, they all came from memory and imagination…

His Optimus Prime robot, the body is the weak part – because I built it! – the face is amazing, he’s watched a couple of the films but that’s it, which makes this all the more incredible to me as he doesn’t own one single Transformer toy.

Batman Bobble head with a, in his own words, ‘tapered back’. I was so surprised that he knew the word ‘tapered’ that I didn’t immediately appreciate the craft that had gone into this.

A Hospital waiting-room for his figures.

They went through a phase of really liking all things Emoji, after watching that terrible, terrible film several times. This is ‘Laughy Tongue’ Emoji.

A great little vehicle, if there’s a sequel to Mad Max: Fury Road, and they need some tips on car designs, they know where to come.

I think this is probably my favourite, we started working on this together, as he wanted to make a Lego version of Midna, a character from the Zelda series of games (Twilight Princess to be specific). I gave up as I just couldn’t figure out how to do it, and went for a coffee. I returned and he’d created this – a fantastic interpretation by anyone’s standards. I love the hat, the eye, the colours…everything just works. And he’s only 6-and-a-half years old.

The two babies came downstairs one day to discover a very big surprise was waiting for them – their very own bath!

They were very, very happy about this and got in straight away!

They were pleased to be in the bath as they had been wearing the same clothes for over a year, and so they absolutely reeked.

They also wore those clothes in the bath, because that’s what you do in a bath isn’t it.

‘This is nice’ said Winky-Eye Baby, as he pretend-sploshed water all over his (her?) clothes.

‘Yes it is’ replied Onesie Baby ‘It’s about bloody time too. I thought my clothes were going to be classed as a biohazard if I let them get any dirtier’.

‘You do know there isn’t actually any water?’ said Winky-Eye Baby, with a worried frown on his (her?) face ‘It’s all just pretend. Don’t tell me you’ve been at the bleach again?!’.

‘It’s real if you wish hard enough’ said Onesie Baby.

‘Well, why don’t you shit in one hand and wish in the other, and see which one fills up first’ replied Winky-Eye Baby.

After their bath the two babies had a lovely game of ‘High Fly’, a fun game which involved them being hurled as fast as they could be at walls and doors, by their boisterous Mummy. She was a very loving Mummy, but she loved in a quite violent way, and so if the two babies were real she would probably be doing about 25 years-to-life in prison for infanticide.

Though if they were real it would probably raise more questions about how a three-and-a-half year-old could have babies.

After their game the two babies decided to have another bath, but were shocked to discover it had been stolen!

Who stole it?

‘It’s that fucking cat!’ said Winky-Eye Baby ‘As if it’s not bad enough that we get used as a teeth and claw sharpener by that thing, now we will have to clean out its hairs before we get back in!’

‘And we might catch toxoplasmosis’ he (she?) added.

‘What’s toxoplasmosis?’ Onesie Baby asked.

‘Its that disease from cat shit that killed Tommy in Trainspotting’ replied Winky-Eye Baby ‘Mind you he was a junkie with AIDS, so we should be alright’

‘Plus we’ve got no central nervous system’ added Onesie Baby.

The cat did look awfully comfortable though, and the two babies worried they would never get their bath back, but just then he woke up!

‘Oh I do hope he doesn’t bite my head again’ said Winky-Eye Baby

‘That’s not the worst thing they do’ replied Onesie Baby ‘I’ve heard when they get older they hump you’

‘No I think that’s dogs’ countered Winky-Eye Baby ‘Plus he’s having his bollocks off next month so it shouldn’t be an issue’.

Just then Mummy arrived, and the two babies had beaming smiles on their faces at the prospect of getting their bath back. Or they would have done if in fact they could smile, and weren’t just moulded lumps of rubber.

TRANSLATED FROM ARTICLE ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN FRENCH NEWSPAPER ‘LE MONDE’

A sleepy French village was rocked to its foundations this week, after it was invaded by English Graffiti Artists. St Nectaire, famous for its relaxing spas and beautiful views, is now synonymous with this ‘art form’ thanks to the efforts of the two spray-can-wielding Brits.

The defacing duo – Big Daddy Pimp (AKA Cumberland Sausage) and his sidekick Lil Bitch-Slapper (AKA Chipolata Sausage) – have claimed ownership of the ‘Ladybird’s Delight’ (their words) which now adorns the abandoned tennis court in the hills of the village. The artwork, which depicts a ladybird on some leaves, is said to highlight the difficulties facing the ‘urban artist’ in modern France. And also West Yorkshire.

Lil Bitch Slapper, with the artwork in full.

“It’s about being true to yourself, yeah” Said Big Daddy Pimp, when he was interviewed earlier this week by the UK Graffiti Bible, Take A Break, “You can be all the colours of the rainbow – as long as they are mainly black and red – but it don’t matter but a ‘ting if you ain’t in touch with where you are coming from”. When asked to translate this into English, Big Daddy Pimp just said ‘Peace. And stay away from the yellow ladybirds, yeah? ‘cos everyone knows they is poisonous”.

“Also dere is a grasshopper” he expands “Because I bought too much green spray paint”.

The duo were raised in the UK, in an ‘Urban Ghetto’ as Pimp refers to it, called Wakefield, West Yorkshire. “Growing up on them streets was tough, yeah” says the urban warrior “Some weeks we was having to work 35, sometimes 37 hours, just to be able to put food on da table” Tears well up in his eyes as he recalls the depths he sometimes had to sink: ” Some weeks I had to work bank holidays…and even Christmas Day…for triple time”.

Big Daddy Pimp and Lil Bitch Slapper first met when Big Daddy Pimp’s Fiancee gave birth to him in 2010. The two, while not immediately close, soon formed a bond that developed into a collective love of art. This love found an outlet in graffiti, with the two going on to ‘decorate’ numerous walls around their area. Together the duo went on to form the graffiti collective known as The West Yorkshire Whippets (AKA The Alotment Boyz).

Feeling the heat led the duo to move away, in an attempt to break free from the underground graffiti scene which was threatening to endanger the lives of not just Big Daddy Pimp, but his family too. “We had run ins wiv da police, and a collective from Barnsley – The Flat Cap Pork Pie gang (AKA Revenge Of Kes) – and it was just getting too much”.

“Dey even keyed me car once” He recalls”I had to get it fixed at Daz’s Chips, Dents and Scratches in Chickenley. It Cost me £130. We only ate two takeaways that week”

So the family upped sticks and moved to France, and for a time it seemed that their completely-illegal artistic-activities had been left behind. But for ‘Cumberland Sausage’ the call of the streets was too strong. “I see a wall, empty, unused and it touches me inside. And if that wall is attached to a tennis court that is rotting away…well I iz going to sort it out and make it magical”.

“Daddy was going to do a lady boy at first weren’t you Daddy?” ‘Chipolata’ chips in “But then I asked him what a lady-boy was, and he went all quiet, and said we should do this instead”.

Following allegations that the artwork featured is not the property of ‘Big Daddy Pimp’ or ‘Lil Bitch Slapper’ and in fact that they are not graffiti-artists, but are just two ex-pats standing in front of someone else’s graffiti, Le Monde would like to apologise to our readers for any confusion caused.